Effects of Exposure to Community Violence on Internalizing Symptoms: Does Desensitization to Violence Occur in African American Youth?

The purpose of the current study was to examine the linear and curvilinear associations of exposure to community violence to internalizing symptoms in 251 African American adolescents (mean age = 12.86, SD = 1.28). Participants reported on exposure to community violence, anxiety symptoms, and depressive symptoms. Regression analyses were used to test the hypotheses and, consistent with predictions, the results indicated that the association between violence and depression was curvilinear; whereas the association to anxiety was linear and positive. The results highlight the importance of considering more complex models of the impact of exposure to community violence on psychological functioning in African American youth from economically- disadvantaged communities.     

Chicago Youths’ Exposure to Community Violence: Contextualizing Spatial Dynamics of Violence and the Relationship With Psychological Functioning

This study explores where and when community violence exposure (CVE) matters for psychological functioning in a sample of low-income, racial/ethnic minority youth (M) age = 16.17, 55% female, 69% Black, and 31% Non-Black/Latinx) living in Chicago. CVE was measured with violent crime data that were geocoded in terms of distance from youths’ home and school addresses, and then calculated in terms of three distinct spatial dynamics: chronicity, pervasiveness, and spatial proximity. These measures reflect indirect/objective CVE across different conceptualizations of time, space, and neighborhood context. We tested the relationship between each CVE measure and trait anxiety and behavioral and cognitive dysregulation while controlling for youth-reported, direct violent victimization (e.g., being attacked) to examine how indirect/objective CVE occurring within youths’ neighborhood contexts matters beyond direct/subjective violence exposure. Results revealed that long-term chronic, pervasive, and spatially proximal CVE was related to higher levels of behavioral dysfunction. In contrast, CVE within home- and school-based neighborhoods interacted to predict trait anxiety; youth living in low-crime neighborhoods and attending schools in high-crime neighborhoods had the highest rates of trait anxiety. Measuring CVE within both home and school neighborhoods at specific spatial measurements and time frames is critical to understand and prevent the consequences of CVE.     

Transactional Associations Between Youths’ Responses to Peer Stress and Depression: The Moderating Roles of Sex and Stress Exposure

This study examined transactional associations between responses to peer stress and depression in youth. Specifically, it tested the hypotheses that (a) depression would predict fewer effortful responses and more involuntary, dysregulated responses to peer stress over time; and (b) fewer adaptive and more maladaptive responses would predict subsequent depression. Youth (M age = 12.41; SD = 1.19; 86 girls, 81 boys) and their maternal caregivers completed semi-structured interviews and questionnaires at three annual waves. Multi-group comparison path analyses were conducted to examine sex and stress-level differences in the proposed reciprocal-influence model. In girls and in youth exposed to high levels of peer stress, maladaptive stress responses predicted more depressive symptoms and adaptive stress responses predicted fewer depressive symptoms at each wave. These findings suggest the utility of preventive interventions for depression designed to enhance the quality of girls’ stress responses. In boys, depression predicted less adaptive and more maladaptive stress responses, but only at the second wave. These findings suggest that interventions designed to reduce boys’ depressive symptoms may help them develop more adaptive stress responses.     

The Roles of Social Media Use and Friendship Quality in Adolescents’ Internalizing Problems and Well-being

Journal of Happiness Studies - Adolescents spend increasing amounts of time using social media, but whether social media use has a beneficial or harmful role in internalizing problems and...     

The Roles of Social Support and Self-Efficacy in Physical Health’s Impact on Depressive and Anxiety Symptoms in Older Adults

Physical illness may precipitate psychological distress among older adults. This study examines whether social support and self-efficacy moderate the associations between physical health and depression and anxiety. Predictions were tested in 222 individuals age 60 or older presenting for help with worry. Physical health was assessed through self-report (subjective) and physical diagnoses (objective). Objective physical health did not have a significant association with depression or anxiety. Worse subjective physical health was associated with increased somatic anxiety, but not with depression or worry. The relationship between subjective physical health and depressive symptoms was moderated by self-efficacy and social support. As predicted, when self-efficacy was low, physical health had its strongest negative association with depressive symptoms such that as physical health improved, depressive symptoms also improved. However, the moderation effect was not as expected for social support; at high levels of social support, worse physical health was associated with increased depressive affect.     

Children’s Externalizing and Internalizing Symptoms over Time: The Role of Individual Differences in Patterns of RSA Responding

We examined associations between basal respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) in conjunction with RSA regulation with the hypothesis that their interaction would explain unique variability in children’s prospective adjustment 2 years later. Participants were 176 children (98 girls; 78 boys) in middle childhood. RSA regulation was assessed through social and problem-solving challenges. Parents reported on children’s internalizing and externalizing symptoms. Interactions between RSA baseline and regulation to the social stressor predicted children’s later internalizing symptoms. Interactions between RSA baseline and responding to the problem-solving stressor predicted children’s externalizing symptoms. The highest levels of internalizing symptoms were predicted for children with both lower basal RSA and higher RSA suppression. The highest levels of externalizing symptoms were predicted for children who demonstrated lower basal RSA in conjunction with RSA augmentation. Findings highlight the importance of the contemporaneous consideration of basal RSA and RSA regulation in the prediction of developmental psychopathology symptomology.     

Toward a Stress Process Model of Children’s Exposure to Physical Family and Community Violence

Theoretically informed models are required to further the comprehensive understanding of children’s ETV. We draw on the stress process paradigm to forward an overall conceptual model of ETV (ETV) in childhood and adolescence. Around this conceptual model, we synthesize research in four dominant areas of the literature which are detailed but often disconnected including: (1) exposure to three forms of physical violence (e.g., child physical maltreatment, interparental violence, and community ETV); (2) the multilevel correlates and causes of ETV (e.g., neighborhood characteristics including concentrated disadvantage; family characteristics including socio-economic status and family stressors); (3) a range of consequences of ETV (e.g., internalizing and externalizing mental health problems, role transitions, and academic outcomes); and (4) multilevel and cross domain mediators and moderators of ETV influences (e.g., school and community factors, family social support, and individual coping resources). We highlight the range of interconnected processes through which violence exposures may influence children and suggest opportunities for prevention and intervention. We further identify needed future research on children’s ETV including coping resources as well as research on cumulative contributions of violence exposure, violence exposure modifications, curvilinearity, and timing of exposure.

The Relation Between Mothers’ Attitudes Toward Maternal Employment and Social Competence of 36-Month-Olds: The Roles of Maternal Psychological Well-Being and Sensitivity

The relation of mothers’ attitudes on the effects of maternal employment on children, psychological well-being, sensitivity of the mother, and children’s socioemotional development were examined in mothers who worked full time (consistently) and mothers who were unemployed during their children’s early years of growth from 6 months of age. Longitudinal observations of 1,213 mothers and children from age 1 to 36 months from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) Study of Early Child Care were analyzed using structural equation models. Mothers and children benefited when maternal attitudes were consistent with the mothers’ actual employment status. Among consistently employed mothers, those with positive attitudes about employment had better psychological well-being. When mothers who were unemployed, they believed that maternal employment would have positive consequences for their children’s development, they preferred working outside home and they were more likely to show a low level of psychological well-being and poor quality of mother-child relation. Additionally, maternal well-being mediated the relation between a mother’s attitudes and a child’s social competence. For both groups, better psychological well-being of mothers was positively related to better child’s socioemotional outcome. Maternal sensitivity, however, did not mediate the relation between maternal attitudes and child’s social outcomes. The findings shed light on the need for a sensitive measure of characterizing mothers who work versus those who stay at home in order to better understand the effects on a child’s development.     

Understanding the Nature and Consequences of Children’s Exposure to Violence: Research Perspectives

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has a long history of supporting research to enhance the scientific understanding of and effective interventions for a range of problems associated with children’s exposure to violence. Recently, funded research has improved our understanding of the nature and consequences of children’s exposure to violence. This article describes an NIH initiative for research on children’s exposure to violence, examples of projects supported by the initiative, and emerging research topics for this important scientific area.

Time Doesn’t Change Everything: The Longitudinal Course of Distress Tolerance and its Relationship with Externalizing and Internalizing Symptoms During Early Adolescence

Although distress tolerance is an emerging construct of empirical interest, we know little about its temporal change, developmental trajectory, and prospective relationships with maladaptive behaviors. The current study examined the developmental trajectory (mean- and individual-level change, and rank-order stability) of distress tolerance in an adolescent sample of boys and girls (N?=?277) followed over a four-year period. Next we examined if distress tolerance influenced change in Externalizing (EXT) and Internalizing (INT) symptoms, and if EXT and INT symptoms in turn influenced change in distress tolerance. Finally, we examined if any of these trends differed by gender. Results indicated that distress tolerance is temporally stable, with little mean- or individual-level change. Latent growth models reported that level of distress tolerance is cross-sectionally associated with both EXT and INT symptoms, yet longitudinally, only associated with EXT symptoms. These results suggest that distress tolerance should be a focus of research on etiology and intervention.     

Maternal Trauma and Children’s Functioning: The Role of Kinship Social Support

Although research has documented the detrimental effects of maternal trauma on child behavior (Lambert, Holzer, & Hasbun, 2014), the role of extended family support in potentially mitigating the effects of intergenerational transmission of trauma is not clearly understood. With a diverse community sample of 52 trauma-exposed mothers and their children between the ages of 7 and 12, we investigated relationships between kinship social support, maternal trauma exposure severity, maternal posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptom severity, and child behavioral problems. Results showed that kinship social support was negatively related to maternal trauma exposure severity, maternal PTSD symptom severity, child internalizing behaviors, and child externalizing behaviors. Additionally, kinship social support moderated the relationship between maternal trauma exposure severity and child internalizing behaviors. These results have implications in the implementation of interventions aimed at supporting diverse families facing trauma that incorporate extended family networks.     

How Does Family Connectedness Contribute to Youths’ Health? The Mediating Role of Coping Strategies

Family connectedness has important implications for adolescents’ well-being, contributing to their physical, psychological, and social health. However, little is known about the mechanisms underlying these effects. The present longitudinal study examined the process by which family connectedness, as perceived by adolescents, predicted greater positive and fewer negative health behaviors in adolescents over time. In particular, we sought to determine whether adaptive and maladaptive coping strategies mediated the link between family connectedness and adolescents’ self-reported health status. Data were obtained from 1,774 New Zealand adolescents aged 10–17 years, who completed a self-report survey three times at one-year intervals. With longitudinal mediation path models, we tested whether maladaptive and adaptive coping strategies at T2 functioned as mediators between family connectedness at T1 and overall health, vitality, sleep sufficiency, body satisfaction, substance use, and self-harm at T3. Findings revealed that family connectedness predicted greater levels of adaptive coping, which, in turn, predicted better health indicators but not decreases in ill-health indicators. Furthermore, family connectedness predicted lower maladaptive coping, which, in turn, predicted higher levels of positive health outcomes and fewer negative health outcomes. Results showed that the positive effect of family connectedness on adolescents’ health occurred through increased use of adaptive coping strategies, decreased use of maladaptive coping strategies, or both. These results have important implications for practitioners working with adolescents and parents, as well as for health promotion program developers.     

Parents’ Reports of Children’s Internalizing Symptoms: Associations with Parents’ Mental Health Symptoms and Substance Use Disorder

This brief report examined the unique associations between parents’ ratings of child internalizing symptoms and their own depression and anxiety in families with parental substance use disorder (SUD). Further, we examined whether parental SUD (father only, mother only, both parents) was related to discrepancy in mothers’ and fathers’ reports of children’s internalizing symptoms. Participants were 97 triads (fathers, mothers) in which one or both parents met criteria for SUD. Polynomial regression analyses were conducted to examine whether father-mother reports of child internalizing symptoms had unique associations with parents’ own symptoms of depression and anxiety while controlling for child gender, child age, and SUD diagnoses. Controlling for fathers’ symptoms and other covariates, mothers experiencing more depression and anxiety symptoms reported more symptoms of child internalizing symptoms than did fathers. Mothers’ and fathers’ SUD was associated with higher anxiety symptoms among mothers after controlling for other variables. A second set of polynomial regressions examined whether father-mother reports of child internalizing symptoms had unique associations with parents’ SUD diagnoses while controlling for child gender and child age. After controlling for mothers’ symptoms and other covariates, parents’ reports of children’s internalizing symptoms were not significantly associated with either parent’s SUD or parental SUD interactions (i.e., both parents have SUD diagnoses). Taken together, mothers’ ratings of children’s internalizing symptoms may be accounted for, in part, by her reports of depression and anxiety symptoms.     

The Role of Fathers’ Depressive Symptoms and Lax and Over-Reactive Discipline in Children’s Externalizing and Internalizing Behaviors

This study examined the role of fathers’ depressive symptoms and lax and over-reactive discipline in children’s externalizing and internalizing behavior problems in a community sample of 36 fathers and their children. Correlational analyses provided considerable support for the expected associations between the study variables. When a regression-based approach recommended by Baron and Kenny (J Personal Soc Psychol 51:1173–1182, 1986) was applied to the data in order to determine whether fathers’ discipline mediated the association between their depressive symptoms and children’s behavior problems, results indicated that fathers’ lax discipline mediated the link between fathers’ depressive symptoms and children’s father-reported internalizing behaviors. In contrast, fathers’ depressive symptoms and lax discipline were independent predictors of children’s father- and mother-reported externalizing behaviors.     

The Role of Religious Orientations in Youth’s Posttraumatic Symptoms After Exposure to Terror

This study examined the effect of religiosity on youth’s posttraumatic symptoms resulting from exposure to terror. Participants consisted of 1,973 Israeli high school students. Objective and subjective exposure (fear) to terror were positively associated with posttraumatic symptoms. Intrinsic religiosity was negatively associated with posttraumatic symptoms and found to decrease the effects of objective exposure. Personal extrinsic orientation and social extrinsic orientation were positively associated with posttraumatic symptoms, having no mediating effect. Theoretical implications regarding religiosity as a coping mechanism in light of exposure to terror are discussed.     

Parents’ Social Status and Children’s Daily Physical Activity: The Role of Familial Socialization and Support

Physical activity is a health relevant factor, particularly in affluent societies where overweight and obesity are increasingly prevalent, even among children. Understanding the development of physical activity patterns in childhood is thus an important issue for health promotion. Following socialization theory, this study describes and explains differences in objectively measured moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) in a socially and ethnically mixed sample of 6- to 11-year-old children in Germany. MVPA levels were objectively measured with accelerometers over the course of six consecutive days (Wednesday to Monday). Parents’ attitudes and practices as well as the family’s socio-economic status (SES) were assessed from the parents via questionnaires. Results indicate that MVPA levels of children vary with gender, but not with age and ethnicity. Moreover, parental SES, parental support for the child’s sports activities, parents’ own sport activities and the parents’ belief in sports’ capacities to foster personality development, character building and social integration significantly predict the MVPA level of children. It is concluded that interventions to promote MVPA among children need to take family interactions and lifestyles into account and should address families in socio-economically underprivileged areas.     

Parental Depression and Child Externalizing and Internalizing Symptoms: Unique Effects of Fathers’ Symptoms and Perceived Conflict as a Mediator

Although a developing body of literature suggests that depressive symptoms in fathers are related to child psychopathology, little evidence suggests that paternal depression plays a unique role in children’s symptoms. We used a high-risk design involving children of mothers with and without histories of depression to test the unique mediating role of father–child conflict in the relations between fathers’ depressive symptoms and child externalizing and internalizing symptoms. In all regression analyses, mothers’ history of depression and current depressive symptoms were controlled. Depressive symptoms in fathers were associated with child externalizing and internalizing symptoms, and father–child conflict. Father–child conflict mediated relations between fathers’ depressive symptoms and child externalizing symptoms above and beyond the effects of maternal depression history and depressive symptoms. The results suggest that negative interpersonal consequences of parental depression on child psychopathology may not be limited to mothers.     

Social Support Mobilization and Deterioration after Mexico’s 1999 Flood: Effects of Context, Gender, and Time

Samples of adults representative of Teziutlán, Puebla, and Villahermosa, Tobasco, were interviewed 6, 12, 18, and 24 months after the devastating 1999 flood and mudslides. The interview contained multiple measures of social support that had been normed for Mexico. Comparisons between sample data and population norms suggested minimal mobilization of received support and substantial deterioration of perceived support and social embeddedness. Social support was lowest in Teziutlán, which had experienced mass casualties and displacement, and among women and persons of lower educational attainment. Disparities according to gender, context, and education grew larger as time passed. The results provide compelling evidence that the international health community must be mindful of social as well as psychological functioning when disasters strike the developing world.     

Specific Pathways from Parental Distress Reactions to Adolescent Depressive Symptoms: The Mediating Role of Youths’ Reactions to Negative Life Events

The current multimethod longitudinal study examines how parents’ distress reactions to adolescents’ negative emotions may shape youths’ own perceptions of negative life events and subsequent increases in depressive symptomology. Ninety adolescents (41 girls, 49 boys, average age?=?16.5 years old) and their parents were assessed over three timepoints. We found that greater parent-reported distress reactions to adolescents’ emotions predicted subsequent increase in youths’ own self-reported negative reactions to stressful experiences over a two-week period, which in turn predicted steeper increases in youth-reported depressive symptoms across this same two-week period. Moreover, youths’ negative reactions mediated the relation between parent emotion socialization and increases in adolescent depressive symptoms. These findings support the use of interventions that simultaneously target parent and child distress to prevent the onset of adolescent depression.